Today marks the day I create my blog. I have debated over having such a thing for a long, long time. Ultimately, I decided it was necessary for two reasons:

1. I am a writer. A writer must write. It is in his name after all. I don’t care if what I say amounts to nothing more than a pile of shit. Great writers aren’t born. They’re made. Yes, I prefer my novels and the occasional poem, but writing is writing. I need to practice anyway I can. One day, I might polish my words into a great literary work, but I certainly won’t do so by sitting around on 9Gag all day and writing only on a whim. Maybe I’ll never be one of the great authors of our time. Maybe I’ll never make more than a clumsy collection of hackneyed phrases. Fine. But I will be bold and I will be persistent. And you can bet I’ll build a dung pile so high that a distant observer might take it for a palace, and a little beetle like me for its crowned leader.

2. I am a human being. To quote my favorite Robin Williams character, John Keating in the Dead Poets Society,

“We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion.”

We as human beings have the need to express ourselves. We are filled with passion, strong, uncontrollable passion, and we cannot bottle it up. With poetry or otherwise, we must express ourselves.

It isn’t a selfish thing. Okay, maybe it’s a little selfish. I crave your attention. I want you to look at me, to admire me, to love me, to hate me, to despise me. Give me compliments or give me curses. Give me a bit of both if you’re feeling in the mood. Just put a little me in your life.

But truly, this isn’t completely selfish. I want to make you think and feel. At the very least, I want to entertain you. Like me or hate me, I will make my voice heard one reader at a time. In time, all of you will have my words floating around in your head. I can’t say whether you’ll be the better for it, but you will be changed. You will have thoughts of things you have not thought to think of. You will have felt emotions, my emotions, emotions you couldn’t have felt without me.